


Pink Candy, Grey Cloud

by bar2d2s



Category: The Flash (Comics)
Genre: Gen, functionally an anti-smoking PSA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-28
Updated: 2017-06-28
Packaged: 2018-11-20 06:19:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11330244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bar2d2s/pseuds/bar2d2s
Summary: Axel doesn't smoke. Everyone else does, though.





	Pink Candy, Grey Cloud

When Owen holds the open pack of cigarettes out to him, Axel hesitates.

The first time he’d tried to snag a cigarette from Evan, he’d been a few days shy of sixteen. They’d just pulled a small job, a test run for the four of them as a unit, and it had gone well. Evan had left his pack on the card table and Axel had figured well, what better time to try out a new vice?

Len had smacked his hand away from the cigs, then cuffed him around the head so hard he was dazed for five solid minutes.

“Don’t even think about it, kid. They’ll stunt your growth.”

When he was 12, his parents broke the bad news that he was going to be getting braces. Axel had to wear them for twenty months, almost two whole goddamn years, and he counted every day. He’d always been a gum chewer, a nail biter. A destroyer of pen caps, and rubber bands, and those big round lollipops you can get two for a dollar at the corner store. Having to watch what he stuck in his mouth for almost _two whole years_  was a form of hell he never wanted to revisit. And he’d be headed right back to hell if Len hit him hard enough to shatter his jaw, so Axel let the subject drop.

Realistically, cigarettes could cause gum rot and mouth cancer. They made your teeth yellow, and your breath smell bad. He looked up pictures of smoker's lungs, to talk himself out of wanting to try the things that have been forbidden to him. The worst thing gum could do was give you cavities. So he stuck to his bubble gum, both the trick kind and the regular, and floated out of the way of the gang’s second hand smoke. For over a year, he did this.

And then Owen sparked one up while they were on lookout duty together for the first time, said “Oh shit, sorry,” and held out his pack to share.

 _How old do you think I am?_  Axel wants to ask, but doesn’t. _For that matter, how old are you?_ He knows that Owen’s old enough to smoke, and old enough that while he might not be legal to drink, Len lets him get away with it. Axel’s 17, but his face is finally starting to lose that last bit of baby fat that made it look so preciously round. Hopefully this means he’s about to grow into his ears, like his mom always said he would. Owen thinks he's looking mature enough to be able to handle a cigarette and suddenly, he really, really wants one.

He goes to take the pack, but stops. Takes out his gum instead. He’s 17. Owen might not know, but Len does. Len smells smoke on his breath, he’ll take his cut away. Maybe worse.

“I’m good, man. Hey, those things’ll kill ya, you know?” Owen laughs, but they’re punctuated with little coughs. It’s humid out, and the moisture in the air is thick enough to choke on.

“In our line of work? Don’t think it’s gonna be smoking that gets me.”

He stubs out the cigarette, though, and nudges Axel until he gives him a tear off his Bubble Tape. When they jump off the roof to meet up with the others at the getaway point, Owen leaves his pack behind.

It’s a little victory, one Axel didn’t even know he was after, but he’ll take it.


End file.
